Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited (BSNL) has reported a widening of net loss to Rs 14.82 billion in the quarter ended (QE) September 2023, from Rs 14.7 billion in the previous quarter. The higher sequential loss during the quarter was primarily due to an increase in expenses on advertisement, business promotion and marketing, interconnect usage charge to other operators, higher revenue share to business partners, bad debt write-off, and expenses on construction contracts, among others. However, on a year-on-year (YoY) basis, the company’s net loss narrowed from Rs 20.33 billion in the corresponding quarter last year largely due to a fall in employee benefit expenses, licence and spectrum fee, finance costs, etc.
Meanwhile, the telco’s revenue from operations fell 5.1 per cent quarter-on-quarter (QoQ) to Rs 40.71 billion. On a YoY basis, the revenue fell 6.6 per cent. For the half year ended September 2023, BSNL recorded a marginal rise in revenue to Rs 83.6 billion. The revenue from cellular business during QE September 2023 was Rs 13.5 billion, as compared to Rs 13.49 billion in the previous quarter. Revenue from leased lines and broadband services fell to Rs 7.03 billion from Rs 8.85 billion and Rs 1.02 billion from Rs 2.05 billion, respectively.
About 14 out of 32 telecom circles reported a fall in revenue during the quarter as well as for the half-year ended September 2023. These 14 circles include Haryana, Andhra Pradesh, Gujarat, Karnataka, Punjab, Sikkim, Tamil Nadu, Jammu and Kashmir, parts of North-East, Telangana, Andaman and Nicobar, and Chhattisgarh.
In a recent letter after the results, PK Purwar, chairman and managing director, BSNL, requested all the circle heads to improve their performance in the remaining half of the year. He also asked the circles that performed weakly to share a detailed plan. Purwar urged all circles to drive quality of service, customer service and sales aggressively to achieve greater revenue growth in the second half of FY24.
